looks like things are heating up in the czech republic over the horrifying practice of shunning children that ask the "wrong" questions.
kids now days have access to all of the watchtower's lies, manipulations, unnecessary deaths, flip flops, rejection of jesus as mediator etc, etc.
i predict this issue of shunning children will continue to threaten free government money that the wt receives.
This is why I wonder if the GB will continue to introduce sweeping changes to the org.
Were the recent changes simply a smokescreen to JW's in order to slide in the change to practises surrounding disfellowshipping and butter up Norway and by extension the EU?
Its going to be interesting to see what happens next.
1/31/2024 in the strange but true category.
confused holy spirit appoints killer servant.
"" a twisted jehovah's witness bludgeoned a woman he rowed with over incomplete building works to death with a hammer, then merrily whistled as he packed up his tools and went to lead a service at the church where they met.
TonusOH
We might be reading too much into this. The guy sounds like a certifiable maniac. It's tragic that this wasn't discovered until he murdered someone. I wonder how those JWs feel that were at the meeting he led, knowing that they were in the presence of a deranged psycopath.
I watched a zoom meeting last night for 15 mins. A sister commented that 'with all the problems going on , its no wonder that there is so much mental illness outside of gods organisation'.
watched a revision of this broadcast on youtube.
im not sure ive ever seen a more cringe-worthy exchange than between david splane and his good buddy 'socky'.. socky told us the story that he read the book 'what has religion done for mankind?
' (1951) when he was 10 and he 'knew' it was the truth.
Watched a revision of this broadcast on youtube. Im not sure Ive ever seen a more cringe-worthy exchange than between David Splane and his good buddy 'Socky'.
Socky told us the story that he read the book 'What has religion done for mankind?' (1951) when he was 10 and he 'knew' it was the truth. I very briefly skimmed through the book and seems to be the usual jw stuff - it has a 'mankinds search for god' vibe with lots of green and purple illustrations common around that time in jw books.
It briefly explains the major religions - and communism, because it was the 50's I guess, and then tells the reader why each and every one of them has done nothing for mankind. It mentioned that in the 19th century, America was a safe haven for religion and gave rise to many cults - without including themselves in the list, of course. The other stuff is predictable - U.N is bad, false religion is a big, dirty harlot, a bit about 607/ 1914 etc.
My takeaway was that the 10 year old Socky, after reading how religion has enslaved humans forever, decided the best thing he could do with his life was to become a slave to a fundamental religion for the next 70 plus years.
Good job Socky!
regarding the poster from jw headquarters, who claimed that the gb would eventually loosen the rules regarding sex.
the question is, is there really a bible rule explicitly prohibiting sex without marriage?
because this would be the only possible reason why loosening those rules would even come up in a discussion.
As a baptised teenager I had an intimate encounter with my then jw girlfriend.😎
My parents found out and made me tell the elders. I'll never forget at the judicial committee one of the elders gleefully saying, "if you were living in ancient Israel, you'd be dead right now."
as there has been some discussion calling bs on this topic, .
i will paste the text from my 10 year plan post and i will critically evaluate how i feel things will turn out.
i will add bold italics my thoughts.. the governing body has a 10-year marketing plan to remodel the organization to become closer to a mainstream christian religion.
no-zombie
no one is coming into the Truth because he can keep is beard or his girlfriend can wear slacks to the meeting.
It all seems to point to the org taking a less dogmatic approach than they have historically done. Lets be honest, some of these changes are about 3 decades overdue.
The mentality of the org - until very recently was the same as it was in the 60's - an old fashioned, controlling dictatorship. That had to change because the world has changed so much and the end wasnt here. It is a new century and the org has lost too much time already.
In the early 20th century, the organisation were called Bible Students, then the name was changed. They believed 1914 was the end - then they changed that. Changing beliefs has led to schisms and a drop in numbers in the past and its actually not a big stretch of the imagination that sweeping changes will be implemented again. Im not saying I believe that all these ideas will be happen, in particular smoking tobacco, drugs and getting tattoos - but who knows?
The org is not what it used to be, and it will keep changing. We know the changes they have made during their history. In 50 years from now, JW's will look at 2024 as the old days and smile at how quaint and old-fashioned we were, and how great it is to be living in 2074 with their 'correct' understanding.
i am thinking that the "ten year plan" that some have spoken of is the most likely scenario.
the org.
has to both attract new members and retain as many existing ones as possible.. so i think they will let the recent changes "bed in" for a while, maybe a year ?
LongHairGal
The death of older Witnesses can be a relief to the religion as they won’t be around to complain about failed prophecies/faulty teachings! Of course, the opposite side of that coin is that these older people are far more faithful than the younger ones would be.
To remember the significance of the 1995 change, a person would have to be at least 40 years old. Even to grasp the significance of Splanes overlapping generations a person would have to be at least 20 + years old to fully appreciate it.
Then you have the older group that goes back way further. Those ones might be more faithful, but they are disappearing. When deciding whether they piss off the old generation or the new - what is the GB banking on - the past, or the future? The changes seem to indicate they are banking on the future.
The older ones will grumble, but due to the sunk cost fallacy, will keep going anyway and the younger ones will love the changes. The ones that disagree will be branded apostates and ignored. This is why everyone that god has killed on the past MAY get a resurrection - even sodomites. The GB has made it clear that apostates (people that critcise them) are the only group that wont make it lol.
now that some reasonably big changes have occurred in a short time frame, whats next?
will the gb let the dust settle for a bit, or will they keep dropping bombs this year?.
Now that some reasonably big changes have occurred in a short time frame, whats next? Will the GB let the dust settle for a bit, or will they keep dropping bombs this year?
i am thinking that the "ten year plan" that some have spoken of is the most likely scenario.
the org.
has to both attract new members and retain as many existing ones as possible.. so i think they will let the recent changes "bed in" for a while, maybe a year ?
Time is both the enemy and friend of the org. There are still way too many of us around that clearly remember pre 1995 , before the generation and so many more changes.
However, that was now almost 30 years ago. Since then, a whole generation of jw's have grown up with the new understanding. In the meantime, how many older ones have passed away - along with their inconvenient memories, which is great for the wt.
Many of us remember our youth consisted of 3 meetings a week, 10 hours witnessing a month and armageddon coming at any moment before the end of the 20th century. It's now 2024 and jw youth have a completely different experience.
Only 2 meetings, with the option to log in remotely. Jw.org to watch cartoons and hear the latest soft rock music. Tick box preaching, no ties or jackets, you can even grow a beard now.
In the 80s and 90s, time was the wt's enemy. As we all get older and less people remember what it used to be really like, the younger generation are growing up with a different normal. Time is becoming the friend of the wt.
Once they remove the weight of the 1914 generation, they are no longer constrained by time pressure.
in a span of a few months time, we have had many unexpected changes announced by the jw organization.
some here have expressed the belief that a great number of witnesses will leave the religion.
in fact, there is a great probability the opposite will be true.. yeah, ancient hardliners will have a hard time assimilating these changes, but the younger generation will likely welcome these changes.
i was really excited about all the wonderful news related to these changes.
i disassociated back in 2019 and my parents have not spoken with me since then.
my brother who never got baptized kind of serves as a liaison between me and my parents as they will not contact me directly.
Ive posted this before. Only a couple of years ago an elder said to me : "to question the GB is to question jehovah".
I would say that this is the attitude of most hard line elders/ jw's. Its not about your value as a human or whether you are living an otherwise moderate lifestyle. Just start asking questions that apear to criticise the GB and they will slap an apostate label on you. Word will spread and - just like that- you're a 'known apostate'.
After these changes though, who knows how things will go. The GB explicitly stated the exception to the arrangement was not to bother with apostates, so they still want to maintain a high level of control.
